Brace Yourself
by mooyoo
Summary: Post "A Dark Turn"


Title: Brace Yourself  
  
Author: rachel  
  
Rating: PG (very tiny bit of language)  
  
Summery: Post-"A Dark Turn"  
  
Spoilers Pretty much anything through "A Dark Turn" with a very tiny direct reference to "Cipher".  
  
Disclaimer: JJ Abrams, ABC, Bad Robot, and probably a whole bunch of other people who aren't me own Alias and its characters.  
  
AN: I haven't completed a story in months, but this has been running around in my head since last Sunday, and being stuck at school during spring break finally gave me some time to actually finish something, so here it is. Hope you like it, but if not I'd appreciate constructive criticism :)  
  
-  
  
I've been walking aimlessly around the city for what seems like hours now, and I wonder what time it is as I notice the sky growing dark and more cars zipping past me with their headlights on. A quick glance at my watch informs me that it's approaching 7pm, and that I've been out here for almost three hours. A chilly breeze rushes past me and I shiver slightly, pulling my hands further into the recesses of my sleeves and hold my arms around myself a little tighter. The cold feeling doesn't leave me, however; it only intensifies the icy ache that has been in the pit of my stomach since this afternoon.  
  
*She left again.*  
  
*She deceived us again.*  
  
*I trusted her again and she betrayed me.*  
  
*Again.  
  
This cold rivals even that of what I felt as the water swirled around me after falling through the ice in Siberia, and I feel again like I'm drowning as the bitter iciness surrounds me. I'm drowning in bitterness.  
  
I think that I should feel sad or angry or betrayed or. something else. But all I feel is cold and I turn my head towards the ground as I brush past a dark-haired, middle-aged woman holding the hands of two small children on either side of her.  
  
After informing us why my mother would once again not be returning to me, my father followed Kendall into a private briefing room, most likely to be reprimanded by the assistant-director. Numbness overtook me before the cold approached, and I turned to look at Vaughn in shock, unable to think or feel anything beyond. He didn't look back at me, however, and I watched as his eyes turned dark and followed my father until a closed door blocked his sight. His hands were clenched tightly into fists and without a word he spun around and walked tightly out of the room. I felt my stomach lurch and the chill begin to engulf me, and knew that I had to get out of the building. So I left work and I didn't look back.  
  
That was three hours ago and I still haven't been able to sort out the thoughts swarming around my head.  
  
*Why did she leave?*  
  
*Why did she turn herself in in the first place?*  
  
*Why didn't I see it before?*  
  
*Did she lie about everything?*  
  
*Why did dad trust her?*  
  
*Why didn't Vaughn's investigation turn up anything?*  
  
*Why did I trust her?*  
  
The last question makes me pause once again as thoughts of her past crimes come flooding back to me like a raging river.  
  
*She killed Vaughn's father.*  
  
*She killed dozens of people.*  
  
*She pretended to be in love with dad to get information out of him.*  
  
*My birth was just part of her mission. I was a prop.*  
  
*She abandoned us. She abandoned me.*  
  
I want to cry. I want to break down right here in the middle of the sidewalk and release the aching, reckless sobs that I know are buried somewhere in my chest, but I know that won't help at all. That's not what I need right now.  
  
I don't know how I end up at his apartment building, but suddenly I'm there, across the street and looking up at what I know is his bedroom window. I see a shadow moving back and forth across the room and I know he's home. It takes only a split-second of deliberation before I dash across the street, weaving stealthily through the busy evening traffic, and enter the building on the heels of a pizza delivery guy.  
  
I stand next to the delivery guy in front of the elevator door for a few seconds, staring up at the lit numbers impatiently. I sigh in frustration after a short moment, however, and turn towards the stairs, pulling the door open and dashing up with a sudden haste that surprises me. There's a desire in me, feels almost like a spark growing into a burn now battling with the cold, which pushes me to run up the stairs to his apartment, desperate to see him.  
  
I emerge from the stairwell and slow my pace to a mere swift walk before finally coming to a stop. My hand shakes as it rises to knock gently on his door, although I'm not sure whether that's because of the knot tightening up in my stomach or the four flights of stairs that I've just run up.  
  
A minute passes with no response from within his apartment.  
  
*Maybe he's busy.*  
  
*Maybe there's someone else there.*  
  
*Maybe he doesn't want to see anyone.*  
  
*Maybe he doesn't want to see me.*  
  
Maybe's flit through my head quickly and I wonder whether I should be here.  
  
*Maybe I should just go.*  
  
Fear is beginning to grip me, warring with the cold; fear that I'm going to hurt him, break him like I have so many others that I've cared about; fear that he equates me with my mother and couldn't possibly want to see a copy of the woman who has made his life so painful right now; fear that I may have lost his trust in the lapse of my own; fear the he's going to hurt me in the end like everyone else has. The cold is winning, however, and the desire to feel warmth wins out in the end. He's the only person who can make me feel warm.  
  
Just as my hand rises to knock a second time, the door is pulled open and his eyes meet mine. I quickly tare mine away, however, although I'm not completely sure why. He doesn't say anything and neither do I, and I wonder once again if it was a mistake to come here as we stand for a moment in thick silence.  
  
I open my mouth and try to form words, but my head is at once both a jumble of a million different thoughts and completely devoid of anything logical, so I settle for the words foremost in my mind, screaming in my head over all the rest.  
  
"I need you," I tell him softly, still unable to lift my head to look at him. My fingers play with the hem of my sweater nervously as the silence continues for another moment, when they are suddenly pulled away by his hand. I look up at him in surprise as he pulls me gently into his apartment and shuts the door, locking it behind me. Without speaking he turns and leads me through his apartment, his fingers intertwining with mine.  
  
I watch him as he walks and I notice for the first time his slightly slouched stance and the way his head is bent towards the ground.  
  
"Vaughn," I breathe softly, but he doesn't reply, doesn't turn to look at me, only continues to lead me down the hallway. His only response is a gentle, almost imperceptible squeeze of my hand and I suddenly realize how tightly he's holding it.  
  
He surprises me when we end up in his bathroom, but before I have a chance to wonder what we're doing here, he reaches over with his free hand to turn on the water in the bathtub, briefly brushing his fingers through the spray, then adjusting the cold handle and testing the water again. Apparently satisfied with the temperature of the water, he turns back to me and drops my hand to pull off his t-shirt.  
  
I finally catch on to his plans and follow suit, pulling my sweater over my head and hanging it on the towel-rack next to the sink. My shirt comes next, followed by my bra and then my shoes and socks. I notice him take off his boxers, his only remaining article of clothing, and then glide easily into the tub, still filling with steaming water. I finish removing off my pants and underwear and follow him into the tub, slipping into the water in front of him.  
  
I reach forward to turn off the water as it threatens to escape over the sides of the tub, and almost immediately afterwards his arms wrap around my shoulders from behind. My arms quickly respond, coming up to wrap around his, and as we hold each other I feel the cold beginning to ease off; warmth spreads through my body, stemming from everyplace he is touching me. I feel his head come to lean against my shoulder and I release a soft breath.  
  
*This is it,* I think. *He's what I need right now.*  
  
My thoughts are startled away from me when I feel his shuddering breath against my back and wetness on my shoulder that I know can't be from the bath water.  
  
I feel him turn his head to bury it against my neck and his tears slide down my back to merge with the water in the tub. The tears buried down in my chest are finally brought up to my eyes and begin to spill over the edges of my eyelids, and I feel his arms hold on to me even tighter as the soft sounds of my crying blend with his. All of the emotion that has been inside of me since learning of my mother's disappearance flows out; the anger and frustration and abandonment and fear come out with my tears, but it's the sadness that hits me the hardest. The horrible, aching sadness claws and tares at me, ripping my insides apart, and I turn my head to lean it against Vaughn's shoulder, needing his warmth to battle against the sadness now as well as the cold.  
  
I feel his quaking, uncontrolled sobs and the rapid rise and fall of his chest against my back and I want to turn to look at him, but somehow that doesn't feel like the right thing to do and I'm suddenly struck by the fact that I've never seen him like this before. The thought scares me and it dawns on me that maybe he needs me just as much as I need him.  
  
-  
  
We lay on his bed, hours later, well after the bath has drawn cold, our hands and feet wrinkled into large, pink raisons. We're on our sides facing each other, only a few inches away from each other, but it's enough space so that our only contact is my hand running gently over the side of his face and through his hair. My other hand plays with the corner of the pillow next to my face absently, while his are sandwiched between his head and the pillow beneath.  
  
I watch him watching me, stare it his eyes fixed on mine, and I see the deep, intense pain that I can only assume is mirrored in my own eyes within the depths of his. The wrinkles have returned to his forehead, deep curves marring his smooth skin and I move my hand down to brush over them, trying to erase the lines of pain from his face. My mind tumbles over thoughts of treachery, duplicity coming at me from a million different angles, rejection and neglect for the second time from a mother I again let myself trust, frustration at not seeing this end coming, and other emotions too vague and jumbled to distinguish. Vaughn's mind remains a mystery to me, however, as he continues to stare at me through stormy eyes, shoulders slouching slightly at my touch.  
  
"Tell me what you're thinking," I ask him softly, the first words ether of us has spoken all evening. His eyes fall closed and he breathes a shaking sigh as my hand sweeps over his ear and back through the short strands of his hair.  
  
His eyes open but he turns his head away from me, shaking it slightly as he directs his sight towards the bed beneath us. He doesn't respond right away and for a moment I think he's going to brush me off again, when I suddenly hear, in a small voice that sounds nothing like his, "I feel. guilty."  
  
I'm not quite sure what he's referring to and when his eyes finally come back up to meet mine I give him a quizzical look. At my questioning expression he sighs again and clarifies, his voice picking up volume and speed as the words tumble out.  
  
"I failed. I feel like he's dead all over again and it's my fault, like I did this." The English Major in me wants to interrupt him, but now is probably not the best time to point out the illogicality of his sentence structure. I assume he's referring to his father, but I let him continue speaking before I ask for more explanation.  
  
"I spent months tracking her, I'm gonna loose my job, I've already lost your trust, and it was all for nothing. I didn't find anything on her and now she's gone - escaped. I failed." He pauses and looks away as he says in a tiny voice, "I failed him."  
  
Pain grips me, guilt and sadness for him grasping my throat, and I shake my head, tears making their way towards my eyes.  
  
"Vaughn, no, Vaughn," I begin, not even fully sure of what I'm trying to dissuade him of, but sure that there's no way he should feel guilty about anything concerning my mother. For all the times he's told me not to atone for her sins, now he's the one who feels responsible for her. I'm utterly confused by this turn of events, fully unprepared for this response from him.  
  
He continues on, as if not even hearing me. "And I'm not saying that I think I did the wrong thing, that if I had it to do over again I'd change anything. I had to do what I did, had to figure her out. but what did I do wrong? Why didn't I find anything, anything?" he asks me, desperation making his voice grow louder, his eyes wider, staring at me as if I have all of his answers. His expression is the same one I've given him thousands of times in the past two years; as if he is the answer to all questions, the healer of all wounds.  
  
I sigh and answer, "Vaughn, you didn't do anything." I trial off, unsure of what I'm saying, and shake my head, taking a breath and beginning again slower and more collected. "You haven't lost my trust."  
  
We remain silent for a while, staring at each other heavily. I continue to stroke the side of his face, running my thumb gently over his cheekbone, and I don't know what to say to him. I've been so hurt, so destroyed over the loss of my mother that my hurt at his investigation of her, his reluctance to share that with me, was pushed to the back of my mind.  
  
Until now.  
  
The misery I felt after learning of his clandestine investigation into my mother, more a result of his not telling me about it until forced than the actual investigation itself, now unites with the pain of my mother's abandonment and I don't even know what it is that I'm so upset about anymore. I'm no longer angry at him, but still not completely over his.  
  
*His what?*  
  
He didn't lie to me, he didn't deceive me, he didn't actually betray me or the CIA.  
  
*But he didn't tell me about something huge, something that concerns both of us. like usual, he didn't talk to me.*  
  
"I wish you could've told me," I say quietly.  
  
He sighs and looks away from me. "Me too." Pausing for a moment, he moves his eyes back to mine. "But what would you've said? What would you've done? Helped me dig up dirt on the mother that you'd just gotten back after twenty years?" He shakes his head before continuing. "I saw how attached to her you were getting. I saw you beginning to trust her, fall in love with her. I couldn't do it. couldn't tell you that I thought she was just using you again and was just going to hurt you again."  
  
He trails off and I shake my head slightly. "But. I don't-"  
  
"I didn't want to hurt you," he interrupts. "Didn't want to have to make you worry about what she might or might not really be up to."  
  
I should've known it would come back to this. Dropping my hand from his head I sigh in frustration and close my eyes, feeling a dull anger begin to build in me.  
  
"Why do you always do that?" I ask, my tone bordering on frantic.  
  
I didn't think it was possible, but his brow takes on even more wrinkles and I watch as his brain tries to grasp what I'm talking about.  
  
"What?" he asks, his tone one of confusion.  
  
"You don't talk to me, don't tell me things, even if they're obviously upsetting you, because you say you don't want to hurt me. it's like you're trying to protect my feelings at the expense of yours."  
  
"I just. you have it so hard. I just don't want to make you're life any harder than it already is."  
  
"But you don't get to decide that for me!" I shoot back at him, angrily waving my hand in front of his face. He flinches, as if my words have hit him like a slap to his face, and the hurt and confusion are evident in his eyes, so I take a breath and soften my voice. "You're not my handler in this relationship, Vaughn." I'm aware of how ridiculous, how ironic those words sound with the title Vaughn attached to the end of them as soon as they leave my mouth and there is a brief moment of amusement between us.  
  
It doesn't last.  
  
"You're not supposed to be handler in this relationship. We're supposed to be partners in this. If something's bothering you, I want to know that you can trust me enough to talk to me about it."  
  
"That's not. it's not about trusting you," he says, shaking his head in obvious frustration. He doesn't speak for a moment, and seems to be thinking of what to say, or maybe how to say it. He looks at me again and for the first time I see in him a naked anguish; a fully unmasked pain playing on his face that he doesn't even try to hide.  
  
"I've never." he takes a hand from beneath his head and runs it across his hair. "I don't. do this much.talk to people about stuff like this.about my dad, about how I feel, how I feel about his death. I just. I just don't. It's hard to talk even to you like this. I'm just not used to it."  
  
"But I've talked you millions of times, about everything. in the past two years anytime I've been upset about something I've come to you. why can't you don't the same with me?"  
  
"Yes. you've talked to me a million times, but I've. I've never done that with you." he trails off and pain hits me again, chasing away what was left of my anger towards him.  
  
I feel that I can't bear to look at him anymore as guilt swirls in me.  
  
*I've never even asked him about himself, about whether he's upset about something.*  
  
"I'm sorry," I whisper, feeling ashamed of myself, of how I've acted towards him over the past two years. He's always been the one to listen to me, been the one person I could confide in, and it never fully occurred to me that I've never extended the favor to him. I'm angry, yes, that he doesn't readily volunteer his feelings and emotions to me, especially on important topics such as my mother, but how often have I even asked, pressed him into talking to me about himself? Until the other day, almost never.  
  
"For what?" he asks me softly, concern lacing his voice. His free hand comes to rest on mine in the center of the bed between us, his fingers running gently over my knuckles.  
  
I just shake my head in response and he doesn't press the issue anymore, and I change the subject back to our original topic of conversation.  
  
"Where you ever going to tell me?"  
  
"Syd," he sighs, pulling his hand away from me, obviously uncomfortable with the question.  
  
I don't know why I'm pressing him on this, but I feel the need to know about what he was doing and I want, for once, to actually talk about what's going on between us and about the big elephant in the room that no one ever seems to acknowledge.  
  
"Were you?" I ask, my tone becoming forceful.  
  
"I don't know," he shoots back at me, his eyes becoming hard, a mixture of sadness and worry within them. "I hadn't thought that much about it." His tone softens. "I knew I would eventually, I wanted to, but. I wasn't sure how to bring it up. I just wish you could've trusted that I wasn't doing anything wrong."  
  
"Vaughn."  
  
"I understand, I mean." he continues as if not hearing me. "After everything that's happened to you; your parents, SD-6, Sloane, Noah Hicks. I get it," he finishes softly.  
  
"I hate this," I tell him. "I hate that this happened, I."  
  
*Fucking Yeager.*  
  
*Fucking CIA and their protocol bullshit.*  
  
"They wanted me to make a copy of your hard drive. on your computer," I clarify nervously, unable to look him in the eye. "At first I refused to even let myself consider it. There was no way, no way that I could believe you would ever do anything to betray the CIA. but as I sat there, listening to them saying these awful things about you, I just couldn't. I kept telling myself that it wasn't possible, but I couldn't get this nagging feeling out of the back of my mind. that maybe it was."  
  
He breathes deeply and though I'm not looking directly at him, I'm sure his forehead is completely occupied by the wrinkles right now. "You made a copy of my hard drive?" he asks me, sounding wounded.  
  
Guilt makes my chest feel heavy, but I force myself to meet his distressed gaze, brushing a strand of hair away from my eyes. "I hate myself for even thinking about it, for even considering helping them to hurt you. it makes me physically ill." My words come out forcefully as I try to convey my anguish over this to him, want to make sure he realizes how horrible I've felt at the thought of hurting him. His eyes continue to look sad, so sad, thinking that I've betrayed him and I can't stand it. "But I didn't. I just couldn't do it. Vaughn, I'm so sorry," I tell him, my voice cracking with pent-up emotion.  
  
"I'm not angry," he says, his voice thick with emotion as well. "I know that it's gotta be hard for you to trust people, I understand. It just kind of hurts that you couldn't trust me. That after everything we've been through, everything we've been through together." He trails off quietly.  
  
"I'm sorry," I say again, and I realize that our conversation is beginning to sound redundant, but he shakes his head again.  
  
"Don't apologize. don't be sorry, it's how you felt. you can't help that."  
  
I want to tell him that I do trust him, that I've always trusted him. I want to tell him that he can talk to me, despite his own fears, whatever they may be. I want to tell him that I need him to be honest with me if a relationship between us is going to work. I want to tell him a million other things, but at a certain point words just aren't enough and I know that I have to show him my faith in him rather than just profess it to him endlessly.  
  
Not to mention the fact that my eyelids are starting to grow heavy, the weight of the past few days finally catching up to me, and I can see the weariness in his body as well, the steady rise and fall of his chest becoming slower and more tranquil. I sigh and close my eyes for a moment, opening them when I feel his arm pulling me towards him. His features have begun to take on more of a relaxing look, his forehead settling to only a few mere ripples. I turn over to face away from him, threading my fingers through his as his arm comes to wrap around my shoulders, holding me in place. Reaching down to the foot of the bed, he pulls a thin throw-blanket up over us, and I feel his lips briefly on the back of my neck through my hair. My eyes droop closed and I realize that despite the relatively small blanket covering us, the cold is long-gone. It can't touch the cocoon we've created here.  
  
*I love you.*  
  
Tomorrow we'll have to deal with the loss of my mother. Tomorrow we'll have to deal with my father's hand in her escape. Tomorrow we'll have to deal with how to get the Rambaldi manuscript out of Sloane's hands. Tomorrow we'll have to deal with the CIA's charges against Vaughn. Tonight, though, was just about the two of us we're nowhere near the end of our long list of issues, but for the moment, it's enough. 


End file.
